Over 50? Keeping Up With Your Healthcare Needs

Over 50? Keeping Up With Your Healthcare Needs

The Blind Have Found A Way To Physically See Without Eyes

Nellie Ryan

What do you consider to be your most important of the five human senses? While taste, touch, hearing, and smell add much to the way humans discover and encounter the world around them, sight is a luxury sometimes taken for granted by those with fully functioning eyes. Within the animal kingdom, bats have discovered an interesting way to see clearly in the otherwise black night... and interestingly, they don't even need to use their eyes to see. By using an amazing process called echolocation, these creatures are able to bounce sound waves off of surrounding objects--making their locations clearly visible. By listening closely, bats can see with their ears, not their eyes. While this is an amazing way that the animal world deals with impaired vision, it doesn't work in the human world... or does it?

Human Echolocation

Amazingly, humans have begun to learn how to echolocate by engaging in a similar process that bats do. By making clicking noises with the tongue, blind people (and even those with sight who can learn the trick) listen intently to how the sound echos off nearby objects. After a bit of practice, the individual will be able to completely navigate the world around them simply by making clicking sounds to judge their location and whatever is placed around them. While this is pretty incredible by itself, most people would assume that it doesn't seem to be a substitute for sight--only a way to fill the void for something that is missing. In reality, however, new studies are beginning to prove something that sounds completely absurd or within the world of science fiction: the blind can actually see.

Seeing Without Eyes

As time and technology evolves, scientists are consistently being surprised by the human brain and the things that it can do. In the case of the visually impaired, the brain has revealed something that researchers would have never guessed: the areas of the brain that are responsible for sight are active when the blind are using echolocation techniques. In other words, blind individuals can not only sense that an object is coming up but can actually make out what that object physically looks like. Within these studies, blind test subjects have been able to differentiate between other people standing before them in a room-- without touching them or hearing their voices.

What this means is that a blind person can legitimately see without having eyes; they can not only navigate the world safely but can determine what objects look like and who people are simply with sound. By scanning the area with sound, the brain is able to construct an image in the mind of the blind person-- a truly spectacular accomplishment.

For more information about eye health, visit http://watsonvision.com/ or a similar website.


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Over 50? Keeping Up With Your Healthcare Needs

As an adult in my 50s, I find that my body isn't as strong as it used to be. But I don't let that stop me from enjoying life! In fact, I make every effort to get the treatments I need from my doctor to improve my health. I know that I'm not a senior yet, but I do all I can to prevent the health problems that affect that age group. Because of this, I put together a health blog for people over age 50. My blog isn't a review of what you can easily find on the Internet. It's a plethora of unique information designed to help you find the services you need fast. What my blog doesn't do is tell you what to do for your health. Instead, it offers guidance and options. Please, enjoy the blog and happy reading.

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